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The wind rushed through Nya'tharr as the sun was slowly making it's way down. Kaessa tucked her long black hair behind her ear and watched the setting sun. It was strange being in Nya'tharr, she hadn't been here since she was a small child. It wasn't a place that she liked to remember. Many unpleasant things happened there.

Kaessa folded her arms over her chest and continued to watch the sun. Her mind drifted. She began to think of several people. She wondered what had happened to her "twin", Aeval. She hadn't seen her in a long time. She'd disappeared. They said they were going to keep in touch, which they had until one day when the letters stopped. Kaessa worried that something terrible had happened to Aeval. She just hoped that she was wrong.

Armand was lost. No... not physically lost, he knew this city too well to ever become that, but he was emotionally lost. And Laurelin was going to accuse him of being a poetic fool again. He supposed she had a right to, it wasn't like her life had been any easier than his for the past two years.

He had had nightmares again. An assignment had kept him out late the night before, and he had tried to sleep during the day. Tried to being the key words. He had woken up about an hour before, haunted by visions of his wife's face. Haunted by the fact he had not been able to save her, that it was his fault that she died. He had dreamed of her death again.

Armand stopped walking and stared into the rays of the dying sun, his eyes seeming to flame with blue in the fading light. He needed to get past this, needed to stop torturing himself over her death. It had been two years. He had a son... although he still wasn't sure where Adrian was. It was time to move on, to focus on things other than his deceased wife and the future that had been so cruelly ripped away from them. He closed his eyes in agony, agony that he forced to turn into determination. He would change... he would forget. He would stop living like this. He had to.

His resolve firm, Armand turned to walk away.

And that was when he saw her.

Her figure was so familiar, her build, her height. He recognized it instantly, even before he focused on her face. She was standing there, around ten feet from him, yet the distance felt non-existent. Armand hesitantly took a step toward her, drinking in the face he was certain he would never see again, except in his dreams. It was beautiful, the skin flawlessly smooth, just like he remembered. Her hair, long, black, and smooth flowed down her back like a silky curtain. It was her, he was sure. Until he saw her eyes. They were shaped exactly the same, but the color... an ablae black instead of a mystic ice blue. Still, that fact did not quite reach his stunned mind as he walked toward her, his face expressionless out of habit.

Kaessa stared at the man walking toward her. She didn't feel threatened by him. She actually felt sorry for him. He face was emotionless but his eyes were betraying him. She could see the sarrow in his eyes. The lonely feeling. It was the same a hers.

He looked familiar but she knew she'd never seen him before. Maybe she knew someone who had told her about him. Kaessa started to open her mouth to say something but the words fell. She couldn't find the words to speak. She stood there waiting for the man to make the first move. She wasn't sure what to do.

Especially with the way he was staring at her. The way he looked like he'd possibly found something he was looking for. The look of love in his eyes. It scared Kaessa. She hadn't seen that look in someone's eyes since Corbin had disappeared.

Armand finally reached her after what seemed like an eternity. He stopped right in front of her, his eyes searching hers. He couldn't believe it... Aeval had died in his arms, it didn't seem possible that she was standing here right in front of him. But he supposed it was possible, it could have been a poison designed to make her look dead. It had to have been that, he had used such things himself in his work. Not to mention that there was no other way to explain the fact that she was standing right in front of him.

Hesitantly, he reached out to touch her cheek, not even thinking of the action, just doing it. He couldn't think, his mind wasn't working. It was stunned, paralyzed on the fact that she was standing there, right in front of him. That she was alive. His mind couldn't process it, he had grieved her too long to even begin to consider the fact that it might have all been a lie. That she might have been alive all this time. All that wasted time, when he could have been with her and their son. But he couldn't even think of Adrian right then, only her. There was only her.

She looked so perfect standing there in front of him, the last rays of the sun playing on her skin and hair. Her eyes looked dark, but it was just the light, he was sure of that. She was Aeval... she was alive. So beautifully alive. A slow smile stole across his lips as he looked at her, his fingers almost touching her cheek.

Kaessa studied him as he approached her. She didn't move. She couldn't move. For some reason. She wasn't sure how she'd become so stunned by this person. She didn't even know him. She had absolutely no idea who he was but yet she couldn't move. She wanted to see what he was going to do.

She didn't flinch when he started reaching out to touch her cheek. She would have grateously welcomed the touch. She hadn't had anyone touch her in a long time. She wanted to remember what it felt like to have someone that close.

Kaessa came out of her daze when she heard him say Aeval's name. At that moment she knew something was wrong. She knew something had happened to Aeval. She hated to be the one to tell him that she wasn't Aeval but se knew she had to.

Her words penetrated his mind, though the true meaning of them did not reach him. The idea that the woman in front of him was anyone but his wife never occurred to him, it would have been impossible to explain to him, he was in too much denial at that moment. Still, his eyes filled with questioning and he searched hers, as if he were looking for an explanation that only she could give him. He didn't understand why she said she was sorry, unless it was for disappearing for the past two years... that had to be it, he couldn't imagine what else her words could possibly mean.

His eyes still looking deep into hers, though they were now searching them, he gently stroked her cheek, his eyes growing even softer in the fading light. Slowly, he slipped his fingers up into her silky hair, its scent reaching out to him.

"Aeval... my love. Why are you apologizing? You have done no wrong... you never have..."

His voice was low and strangely affected by emotion as he moved to kiss her.

Kaessa let out a ragged sigh. She didn't want to have to tell him that she wasn't Aeval. She knew he would be heartbroken. She could tell by the way he spoke to her. Kaessa reached up and took Armand's hand. She pulled it away from her face and let go of it once she had lowered it. She shook her head.

"I'm not Aeval," Kaessa whispered as Armand started to get closer to her. She stood there waiting for his reaction. She hoped that he wouldn't do something that he regretted. She hoped she didn't do something she regretted. But she knew she couldn't go on in the lie that they were sharing.

Armand stared at her for a long moment, her words not quite reaching him, yet they did in a way that was cruel and agonizing. He didn't understand... how could she say she wasn't Aeval when she obviously was?

Suddenly, his eyes widened and he took several big steps away from her, in what almost looked like panic. Then his eyes and face cleared of emotion, just as they had so many times when he was hurting so deeply. He couldn't believe what he had almost done... now that he was thinking clearer he could see differences between the girl in front of him and Aeval. There were not many, and they were only slight differences that a person on the street would not see. But Armand had known his wife better than anyone, so he alone saw them. But of course, there were her eyes, which were so noticeably different that he wondered how he had missed it when he first saw her.

Armand forced himself to refocus on her, he had to apologize, had to rectify this embarrassing situation somehow. Unfortunately, he had no earthly idea on how to do so.

"Please, pardon me. I apologize for... thinking you were someone else. I hope you can forgive me..."

The apology was incredibly inadequate, making him want to cringe. He couldn't remember ever having done something this amazingly stupid.

Kaessa could see the pain in his eyes. Her heart began to ache. She could tell that Armand cared about Aeval deeply. Kaessa lowered her eyes and scuffed the ground with her shoe. She wished she could have that feeling back. She wished she could have the feeling of someone caring about her. But it was torn away just as she assumed Armand's had. She knew what Armand was going through.

"There's no need to apologize, I know I look a lot like Aeval," Kaessa said once she looked back up at Armand.

Armand smiled weakly at her answer, wanting more than anything to flee. He was so hurt over his wife's death that he was seeing her in strangers.... briefly he wondered if he was going insane. It seemed sadly probable, his longing for her was driving him more than mad.

"Even so, I still owe you an apology."

His voice was low and slightly strained, showing how tense he was from his raging emotions.